Regular readers will have noticed that for the past 3 weeks, my blogging output has slowed to a mere trickle

“What’s up?” You may ask.  (Thank you for your concern)

A convergence of factors, really.  Chief among them is a goal.  For much of the past 15 years I’ve struggled with weight and healthy eating habits.  Last year at this time, I had ballooned up to 230 pounds (Yes, mom, 230.  Please don’t be horrified).

With a new weight training regimen, I got that down to around 215, but then plateaued through the spring and summer, with it subsequently creeping back up to 224.

I’ve long had the goal to get back below 200.  Now I set a time limit: 13 weeks.

To help me advance toward that goal, I bought a new tool – the Best Self Journal.  It’s a daily journal to help you track your habits and behaviors as you focus upon 2-3 goals for a 13 week period.  I like the journal because it encourages morning and evening gratitude and it encourages daily self-reflection for improvement.

So I’m four weeks in, six pounds down, and making great progress on my weight goal as well as the two other goals I had listed.

The problem, however, is that having a goal messes everything else up.  I’m working out 5 times a week now, alternating strength training and cardio training.  Meanwhile, my girls are gearing up for a new school year and a new season of swimming, and the church is gearing up for fall activities.  With these new goals, something had to slide.

Alas it was blogging.

But this is not a long term solution.

Blogging is a part of my strategy for church outreach, and I want to grow the audience of this blog by providing great information about applying the wisdom of the past and the truths of God’s word to the challenges of today.   Your feedback and encouragement is really valuable to me, and so I want to keep providing you great material.

So, this gets us to the challenge.   As we change and grow, we have to re-orient parts of our lives.  Any kind of life change will have unexpected consequences – there is pushback of some kind.  The challenge is to persist through the pushback until the re-orientation is done.  That’s a true breakthrough.

So that is what I’m working on.

Have no fear, I’ll be back to blogging regularly soon.  I just need to figure out how to better order my days so that I can get it all in.  I do have a few draft posts in the pipeline, and of course I have lots of sermon material that I’m trying to digest into helpful, readable posts.

So I’m asking you to hang in there with me.  This is a great time to check out some of the post archives and give me feedback on how helpful they are.

Most of all, I’m glad to have you all with me on this journey as together we grow more and more into the people God is shaping us to be.

Now go be a blessing!

RS